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The Decentred Autonomous Subject

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Identity and Difference

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Abstract

According to the post-structuralist critique of the subject, we can no longer properly understand ourselves as a unified, sovereign subject, insofar as the overriding experience we have of ourselves is that of a decentred self, a subject that is constantly in process of becoming. While many feminists support this claim, others argue that endorsing it makes it impossible to develop an account of autonomy or political emancipation.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Lloyd, Beyond Identity Politics, p. 13.

  2. 2.

    Ibid., p. 36.

  3. 3.

    Ibid., pp. 35–36.

  4. 4.

    Ibid., p. 36.

  5. 5.

    Rorty, ‘Freud and Moral Reflection’, p. 155.

  6. 6.

    Guignon, On Being Authentic, p. 123.

  7. 7.

    McNay, Gender and Agency, p. 75.

  8. 8.

    Guignon, p. 125.

  9. 9.

    Sayers, ‘Identity and Community’, p. 157.

  10. 10.

    Flax, Thinking Fragments, pp. 218–219.

  11. 11.

    Brown ‘Feminist Hesitation, Postmodern Exposures,’ p. 71.

  12. 12.

    Whitford, Luce Irigaray: Philosophy in the Feminine, p. 123.

  13. 13.

    Flax, p. 222.

  14. 14.

    McNay, The Misguided Search for the Political, p. 99.

  15. 15.

    Ibid., p. 208.

  16. 16.

    Grimshaw, ‘Autonomy and Identity in Feminist Thinking’, p. 105.

  17. 17.

    Ricoeur, Oneself as Another, p. 23.

  18. 18.

    Simms, Paul Ricoeur, p. 84.

  19. 19.

    Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, Volume One, p. 66.

  20. 20.

    Ricoeur, Oneself as Another, p. 141.

  21. 21.

    Ibid., p. 142.

  22. 22.

    Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, Volume One, p. 71.

  23. 23.

    Ricoeur, Oneself as Another, p. 54.

  24. 24.

    Ibid., p. 118.

  25. 25.

    It is worth noting at this point the origin of Ricouer’s work in Kantian thought. In the Paralogisms, Kant distinguishes his understanding of subjectivity from that of Descartes. Namely he argues that simply because we are aware of the unity of our consciousness it does not follow that we possess the consciousness of a unity. This is because Kant regards the unity of consciousness as a ‘formal’ unity rather than a unity that results from understanding the self as a mental substance.

  26. 26.

    Ibid., p. 118.

  27. 27.

    Ibid., p. 118.

  28. 28.

    Ricoeur, ‘Life in Quest of Narrative’, p. 24.

  29. 29.

    Ibid., p. 24.

  30. 30.

    Ibid., p. 25.

  31. 31.

    Ricoeur, Oneself as Another, p. 121

  32. 32.

    Ibid., p. 121.

  33. 33.

    Ibid., p. 121.

  34. 34.

    Ibid., p. 124.

  35. 35.

    Ibid., p. 140.

  36. 36.

    Ibid., p. 143.

  37. 37.

    Ibid., p. 147.

  38. 38.

    Ricoeur, ’Autonomy and Vulnerability’, p. 73.

  39. 39.

    Ibid., p. 76.

  40. 40.

    Ibid., p. 80.

  41. 41.

    McCarthy Dennet and Ricoeur on the Narrative Self, p. 230.

  42. 42.

    Ibid., p. 232

  43. 43.

    Ibid., p. 239.

  44. 44.

    Ricoeur, ‘Autonomy and Vulnerability’, p. 77.

  45. 45.

    McCarthy, p. 238.

  46. 46.

    Brison, ‘Outliving Oneself’

  47. 47.

    Shay, Achilles in Vietnam, p. 172.

  48. 48.

    Brison, p. 23.

  49. 49.

    Meyers, Self, Society, and Personal Choice, p. 57.

  50. 50.

    Ibid., pp. 57–58.

  51. 51.

    Ibid., p. 56.

  52. 52.

    Meyers, ‘Intersectional Identity and the Authentic Self’, p. 166.

  53. 53.

    Rössler, ‘Problems with Autonomy’, p. 143.

  54. 54.

    Meyers, Self, Society, and Personal Choice, p. 85.

  55. 55.

    Ibid., p. 87.

  56. 56.

    Anonymous respondent quoted in V. Binney, G. Harkell and J. Nixon, Leaving Violent Men, p. 4.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Kent, Canterbury, England

    Kathy Butterworth

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  1. Kathy Butterworth
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  1. University of Johannesburg, Johannesburg, South Africa

    Rafael Winkler

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Butterworth, K. (2016). The Decentred Autonomous Subject. In: Winkler, R. (eds) Identity and Difference. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-40427-1_7

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